The District of North Vancouver is on track to meet if not exceed the number of net new homes the province says the municipality should be completing.
In the fall of 2023, the district was one of 10 governments flagged by Housing Minster Ravi Khalon for failing to deliver enough new housing. The ministry set for the district of 2,838 net new homes by October 2028.
Halfway through the first year since the targets were introduced, the district has completed 388 – more than three quarters of the annual goal of 499. Beyond that, there are another 2,614 new multi-family homes already approved through rezoning but not given building permits.
“This does give us an indication that not only are we on track for the first six months, that we may be well on track for the entire five years,” senior planner Tina Atva told council. “Of course, we will need to see how things unfold.”
In his conversations with developers, Mayor Mike Little said the biggest factor impacting when new projects break ground is interest rates, which remain too high for some developers to finance their projects.
“You may have a bit of a gap moving through the system if they’re anticipating waiting for preferable borrowing conditions,” he said. “Some of those things are outside of our hands. They are tied to the economic conditions, the risk profiles that the development community is comfortable with.”
Coun. Jim Hanson expressed frustration with the district even being named to the so-called “naughty list.”
“I remain at a loss to know why we were singled out in such a prominent way for this housing order when what was mandated upon us … is actually to produce less housing than we have been,” he said.
Coun. Lisa Muri added the province’s housing targets are too focussed on delivering market rentals and stratas and not enough below-market homes that would be accessible for local workers. She went on to criticize the province’s direction on housing more broadly.
“The one power that we have is land use. The province has removed that from our ability and they are not focusing on affordable housing,” she said. “The supply and demand rule of decades ago is not working in this community. Why? Because when you have three ski hills in your backyard, when you have beaches at your doorstep, when you have world class trails, when you are an hour and a half away from one of the greatest places to ski in the world, there’s a price to that. Location, location, location.”
